Northland School Division

Northland School Division (NSD) continues to focus on supporting school goals for reconciliation through the leadership of community Elders and Knowledge Keepers. These leaders play a key role in ᐊᐧᐦᑯᐦᑐᐃᐧᐣ Wahkohtowin Everyday, ensuring schools encourage the learning of local histories, cultural and language traditions, and worldviews in curriculum, resources, assessment, and classroom practices.

As resource Elder, Virginia Cardinal continues to support the Education Plan by building relationships, leadership and ways of preserving kinship and interconnections using traditional ways of knowing, doing and being. She works in the First Nations, Metis and Inuit Department under Director, Debbie Mineault supporting school commitments in NSD priorities that build recognition and acknowledgement in culture, language and land based learning.

To support Indigenous culture, language and land-based learning, the First Nations, Metis and Inuit (FNMI) team is hosting one hour Zoom sessions. 

For the month of April, Elder Virginia Cardinal will be using Cree Indigenous literature (books) to teach local syllabic knowledge and syllabic writing skills. She models language use, culture, and learning through read-aloud strategies that support listening skills and encourage students to explore how Cree culture and language are represented in the stories she shares. These student-favourite books are chosen for personal enjoyment and offer many opportunities to illustrate favourite words and practise Cree language use. The book illustrations help build oral proficiency by supporting the recognition of letter sounds, which leads to word formation and, eventually, the development of phrases. 

April Learning Principle is Cree Indigenous Literature (Books)